Using iPad/keyboard dock combo in your lap

Question

Hello all!
My ancient Windows laptop that we use as our secondary computer is dying, and we are seriously considering replacing it with an iPad. Something like 95 percent of the time, this computer is used by my wife, sitting in the recliner in our office, for Web surfing and light email -- in other words, pretty much exactly what the iPad is designed for.
It would sometimes be useful for her to have a real keyboard, though, since she sometimes uses the laptop to take notes at meetings or write longer emails that might get frustrating using the on-screen keyboard (she is a touch-typer). I am wondering how awkward it would be to use the iPad with the keyboard dock not on a solid surface, but sitting in a recliner or on a couch. I know the iPad is quite light but because of the keyboard plugs in in portrait mode it looks like it would be somewhat top-heavy in that configuration.
I know I will get responses here telling me that the iPad is not a laptop replacement and blah blah blah, to which I say pre-emptively: YES, I KNOW THIS. Like I said, virtually all of the use that it would see would be just what it's designed for. I'm sure that using the plug-in keyboard in one's lap would be more awkward than using a real laptop; I'm just trying to find out if it would be doable, so that the iPad wouldn't be completely useless in those scenarios.
Thanks in advance,
Josh

Answer 1

The connector on the Apple keyboard is of bad design. The leverage that the iPad places agains the dock connector tab on the keyboard (because it only docks to the keyboard in the portrait mode) puts too much stress on that connector tab.
I have had to have two keyboards replaced, because the connector tab came loose, and they have only been used on my desk.
Apple should have put a dock connector on the landscape side of the iPad itself (too) so that you could put the iPad into the keyboard in the landscape position, which would put less physical stress on the keyboard connector tab.
I could never imagine using the thing on my lap in the current embodiment.
This keyboard connection makes it almost impossible to use on an aircraft as well, and should be redesigned.